Zelda's saying more and repeating more words, but it's hard to think of every word she's repeating. Her main phrase is still "Mmhmm," which she uses as the answer to most questions directed at her. This morning she was saying "No," though, and Ellie was following her around asking her questions and she was answering "No, no," in her little voice and it was so cute. Yesterday when the girls were taking a bath I counted down "5...4...3...2..1...blast off!" And Zelda repeated "Blast off!" after me. It sounded really close, too! She's like a surprising little parrot, haha. :)

What we did this week:

This week was crazy. "Winter Storm Octavia" blasted through on Monday night, pouring freezing rain all night long and coating everything in half an inch of solid ice. When we looked outside on Tuesday, it looked all snowy and we were excited to take the girls out to play. But as soon as we got outside, we realized that while it looked like snow, everything was covered in ice. The whole world was like an ice skating rink.

Here's our first couple moments coming out the door:

I've never seen anything like it. The bushes were particularly cool; every single leaf had half an inch of ice on top. If you were careful, you could slide the ice off the plant and have a big piece of ice shaped like a bunch of little leaves.

Our car was absolutely coated in ice:

The front car window

Another angle of the car

Some of the plants

The girls (well, really Ellie) had a blast playing in it. (Zelda just kind of stood on one spot of the lawn, watching the rest of us.) Ellie liked stomping through the ice on the lawn, crunching down to the grass.

After a little while we ventured to the backyard (we had to scoot, crouching, to get there, because we were sliding down an ice hill to get there). We tore up an old cardboard box we had back there, and used the pieces to go sledding. It was really fun, and this little hill we have worked really well. Both girls loved it.

We went in after that (Ellie and Zelda were getting cold), but we did go out again later in the day and played again. While Jason was shoveling our walkway so that we could get back up our
steps, Ellie and I built a snowman. She really really liked building the snowman. (Also, she made it a potty. The bunch of leaves in front of it is its "snowman potty.")

Jason's classes were originally supposed to be delayed until 11 on Tuesday, but after the ice storm came through and the school saw how bad it was they canceled classes entirely. All of the schools in the county were actually closed (along with several surrounding counties), and the North Carolina governor actually declared a state of emergency. No one left our block that day; we saw neighbors out shoveling and some playing in the snow, but no one drove to work like they usually do. It would have been impossible.

Luckily the next day was warmer and the ice on the roads melted. Jason's classes resumed (with a delayed schedule), and we played outside again later in the day. About six that evening, it started to snow. Real snow. We quickly bundled up the girls and I took them outside. We tried to catch snowflakes with our hands, and our mouths. It was fun looking up into the sky and see them twirling down.

After all the ice and snow had passed, the really cold air came and settled in. Apparently the air was coming straight from Siberia over the North Pole to us. Our lows the last couple days have been single digits, with wind chill pushing them down into the negatives. But, it's warming up somewhat now, so that's good.

On the computer front - well, we decided to buy a new one. Jason took apart the old one last Saturday to see if her could fix it, and it was a no-go. There was nothing to be done. So he researched new computers and we ordered one earlier in the week. Our last computer was an all-in-one (no tower) which was great because of the lack of cords, but we decided to go with a more traditional monitor+tower computer this time for performance. It has 3 terabytes of memory, which I just can't get over.

We were trying to decided between using Linux for the operating system or buying Windows 7. Linux is free, and Windows 7 is five years old at this point (and Windows 10 is coming out this summer), so we decided to try Linux. But after doing Jason so much work and getting Linux all set up on the computer Friday night and Saturday morning, we figured out that it Adobe Photoshop can't work on Linux. I use photoshop more than any other program on the computer. Linux does have a photoshop-like program called GIMP, but it's missing some of the tools photoshop has and also has a "steep learning curve." So, we (/I) decided to order Windows 7. I feel really bad; Jason's already put so much work into setting up the computer with Linux. :( - guilty-feeling Jocelyn.

Saturday was Valentine's Day. We had a yummy breakfast in the morning (complete with bacon and orange juice), did a new puzzle later, and played more Lego Hobbit on the ps3 after the girls went to sleep. It was great. I decorated our mantle with some hearts and snowflakes a few days before. Ellie decorated too, on the walls:

Ellie and I also made some colored rice this week for her and Zelda to play with. I've seen it on Pinterest a couple times, but assumed it was complicated and didn't look at how to make it. Well, I looked it up this week, and it's actually really easy! You just put a cup of rice in a bag with a tablespoon of vinegar and some squirts of food coloring, close the bag and mix it up, then spread it out to dry. It dries really fast and then it's ready to play with! Ellie really liked making it, and both girls love playing with it. I've been cleaning a lot of rice up from our floor this week.

Some random pictures and stories from this week:

(As Jason said, "This seems a bit backwards.")

The girls in new valentine jammies from their Nana:

Zelda took this selfie at some point:

One day Jason built a fort for the girls in the playroom. At bedtime, Ellie expressed her desire to sleep in the fort. We told her that she couldn't sleep in the playroom, but if we carried it into her bedroom she could sleep in it. She said, "But I'm too heavy!" (=it was too heavy for her to carry.) When we told her Daddy would carry it for her, she got really excited. We moved it into her room and set her up, and that's where she slept that night!

And a video of the girls playing in the fort earlier that day:

I think that's everything...my brain feels a little fried because it's been kind of a crazy week.

2 comments:

Okay, that ice looks insane! Yikes! I know I've said before how much I love Ellie's haircut--I'm trying to convince the husband to let me get Bean's cut similarly, it's just so darling! And the rice is pretty cool, I think we may have to try it :)

Welcome to the epic record of our family's adventures! My name is Jocelyn. My husband Jason and I have been best friends ever since we started high school. We got married on April 23, 2010, in the Newport Beach Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We are currently living in Texas with our beautiful little girls, Ellie, Zelda, and Susanna.